For Tyope had hardly ever spoken to him, still less done him any wrong.

But Okoya's mother had spoken of Tyope as a bad man, as a dangerous man, as one whom it was Okoya's duty to avoid.

And so her son feared Tyope, and dared not think of the bad man's daughter as his future companion through life.

Now everything was changed.
Mitsha's mother had said that Tyope was a friend of his father, and that Tyope would not be angry if Okoya came to her house.

Then he was not, after all, the fiend that Say Koitza had pictured him.